Is this per individual or per household? This can be confusing as the IRS requires annual reported benefits to be for both spouses.

It's per individual. Most Social Security statistics are based on amounts paid to an individual. The link I provided was to a table providing the Social Security worker's benefit being paid by monthly amounts. The worker's benefit amounts range from less than $100 to $4,000 or more per month.

FWIW, the maximum monthly Social Security benefit in 2018 is $2,788...

In 2018, the maximum monthly Primary Insurance Amount (PIA) is $2,788; however, after the PIA amount is adjusted for early or delayed claiming of benefits, annual COLA earned from age 62 to when Social Security benefits are claimed are applied to the PIA to calculate your monthly benefit.

I can't think of any situation where individual benefits would be over $4,000/mo.

The link that I provided reports that 1,352 individuals are receiving more than $4,000 per month in retired worker's benefits. Most of these appear to be woman that are now receiving their spouse's retired worker's benefit after their husband died. Regardless of sex, the largest age group receiving more the $4,000 per month are 90 or older.

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Perhaps, I should have stated that I was asking for the gross Social Security worker's benefit amount. I didn't think about that as I use Quicken to track my finances and Social Security deposits are entered as split transactions: the gross amount less any deductions for Medicare Part A, Part B, or Part D. This approach makes it easy to match up with the SSA-1099 that is received at the end of the year.

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